Saturday 28 November 2009

Jack the Ripper

I’ve always been intrigued by Jack the Ripper. The murders as such do not interest me – I hate blood and gore. It’s the mystery that surrounds them and a keen interest in Victorian history, especially the East End of London, that draws me in.

I have many books on the subject, including, The Jack the Ripper Suspects by Stan Russo which cites 70 suspects – a must for all ripperologists, apparently. I bought it a few years back and it was fairly expensive then but now it sells on Amazon for £42.70 – ooh, er, I guess that makes me a ripperologist then!

You may be wondereing why I’m on about evil Jack today. Well I went on a Ripper Tour last Wednesday and it was absolutely fab. The combination of looking around the East End, a fantastic tour guide: Philip Hutchinson who co-wrote The London of Jack the Ripper (another great book) and actually seeing where the murders took place made for a brilliant evening.

You know, it’s quite strange – my novel isn’t a murder at all, and yet I’ve managed to thread in a couple of references to Jack the Ripper. And I've got a short story whizzing around my head, spurred by the evening, that I really must get down! Well, they say write about what you know, don’t they?

I was going to pop on my photographs, but they are very dark and only this one of The Ten Bells Pub came out reasonably well. It's said that in the early hours of November 9th 1888, Mary Kelly, Jack's final victim, left this pub to meet her demise. It's said too that Jack the Ripper haunts here.




Please don't forget if you're interested in joining 'Womag two Weekly' there are still spaces - so do email me!

Wednesday 25 November 2009

Womag Two Weekly!


Calling all womag writers out there! I’m hoping to start a private writing blog that runs simultaneously with the already successful group, ‘Get It Write’ which has been up and running now for six months.

The difference with this group is it will focus purely on short stories for women’s magazines (rather than all writing, as is the case with ‘Get it Write’)

Cally Taylor has kindly given me permission to run the group to the same format as a ‘Story a Fortnight’ – although she won’t be involved with the running of ‘Womag two Weekly’ (may have to change that name - ha!) group in any way. It will be me and whoever dares come on board.

If you are a writer of short stories aimed at magazines such as My Weekly, Woman’s Weekly, People’s Friends etc. and would be interested in submitting and commenting on this type of story on a fortnightly basis, please email me a.s.a.p. My email address is on my profile! So let's see what the demand is and go from there....GREAT!

Wednesday 18 November 2009

Lovely Award


Super Debs has passed this lovely award on to me – Thank you so much Debs you’ve made my week! If you haven’t popped over to her blog – which I’m sure most of you have -it’s wonderful – go now – no wait – finish reading my blog first!

The award rules are as follows:

1) Accept the award, and don’t forget to post a link back to the awarding person = CHECK.

2) Pass the award on – ooh this is tricky there are so many fantastic blogs – but I would like to pass it on to the very lovely Suzanne – who despite unscheduled interruptions – still has a great plan – Keep on going Suzanne!!! = CHECK

3) Notify the award winners – email winging its way = CHECK

Apart from this lovely award from Debs, I was most excited to get a response from My Weekly today thanking me for one of the stories I sent – that's it, just a thank you! I know, little things! HA!!

Friday 13 November 2009

A Deflated Balloon


Yes, that’s me!

Well not a balloon as such, but I am a little deflated as a writer.

I think I must have ‘I love rejections’ written on my forehead, and magazines are intent on trying to please me. Because frankly, they’re pouring in; two from People’s Friends – one took less than a week to wing its way back to me, and there was a blinking postal strike on at the time. The next came a week later with an identical reason for rejection – I’m suspecting form letters here! I’ve also had one from Allas Magazine, one from The Weekly News and another from That’s Life Australia – all in the last few weeks. Swearwords!

But I refuse to let it grind me down. I’ll keep sending out my short stories whether they want them or not – I’m tough! I can take it! HA!

On a positive though, my novel, which underwent a mammoth culling of characters and storyline recently, is now finished – AGAIN – and guess what, it’s visiting a friend. Yes, a very lovely blogging pal is reading it through – cover to cover – so exciting!

Also – I still have nine short stories out there – so there’s still hope! Yes? And I’ve written a story for the Mslexia competition and I’m working on a story for Cally’s Heaven Competition.

How’s that for refusing to let it beat me! Go me! I think!